Google ranking filter
A colloquial label for reduced website visibility. Distinguish manual actions, algorithm changes and technical problems; traffic decline alone does not identify a cause.
Definition and sourcesKNOWLEDGE / FROM A TO Z
Glossary
Technology, explained clearly. Find a term, choose a letter or narrow the topic. Definitions include sources and their review date.
Terms 94 / 685
Clear filtersGoogle Search Console
A Google service reporting on search presence, indexing and selected technical problems. It does not purchase rankings. Reports change over time, and the tool does not guarantee every submitted page will be indexed.
Definition and sourcesGoogle spam update
An update to Google's systems detecting spam-policy violations. A coinciding traffic drop does not prove causation; website and data analysis are needed.
Definition and sourcesGooglebot
The name of Google's search crawling agents. User-Agent headers are easily spoofed; crawler identity can be verified using recommended methods.
Definition and sourcesGrey-hat SEO
An informal label for supposedly borderline SEO practices. It is no official safety category; policy compliance depends on the action, not the label.
Definition and sourcesHreflang
Markup identifying alternative language or regional versions. It should point to genuine equivalents with reciprocal consistency; it does not translate content automatically.
Definition and sourcesHTML headings
The h1–h6 elements express content hierarchy, not font size. One principal h1 is a clear editorial convention. The number of h1 elements is not a simple Google ranking rule.
Definition and sourcesHTML title element
An imprecise colloquial name for HTML's title element, not a meta tag. It names the page; Google may generate a different result title.
Definition and sourcesInternal linking
Linking pages within the same website. It helps users and crawlers discover content and should reflect topic relationships and navigation needs.
Definition and sourcesJSON-LD
A way to represent linked data in JSON with context defining terms. In SEO it is one format for structured-data markup.
Definition and sourcesKeyword
A word or phrase describing a query and content topic. Planning should consider intent and audience language, not just exact repetition.
Definition and sourcesKeyword cannibalisation
Similar pages competing for the same search need and splitting signals. Using a phrase on several pages alone does not establish a problem.
Definition and sourcesKeyword clustering
Grouping keywords by topic and intent to plan suitable pages. Similar wording is insufficient when users seek different answers.
Definition and sourcesKeyword density
A phrase's occurrence ratio relative to text length, depending on counting rules. No universal percentage guarantees rankings; meaning and usefulness matter more.
Definition and sourcesKeyword stuffing
Unnaturally filling a page with keywords to manipulate results. It can involve lists, repetition or hidden text and violates Google's policies.
Definition and sourcesLink building
Earning links through valuable material and relationships. Buying links to manipulate rankings can violate search policies; link count alone is insufficient.
Definition and sourcesLink equity
A colloquial term for ranking signals associated with links. It is not an official public Google measurement or a simple quantity divided by link count.
Definition and sourcesLink exchange scheme
An organised link-exchange system intended to influence rankings. Manipulative large-scale schemes can violate search policies regardless of the service's name.
Definition and sourcesLocal SEO
Activities improving a business's visibility in location-related searches. They include consistent business information, content and profiles, without guaranteeing a position.
Definition and sourcesLong-tail keywords
Queries from the lower-volume part of the search distribution, often more specific. Long tail does not simply mean any phrase with many words.
Definition and sourcesMajestic
A backlink and link-profile analysis tool. Trust Flow and Citation Flow are Majestic metrics rather than official Google scores.
Definition and sourcesMeta description
A page description supplied in meta name="description". Search engines may use it or choose another content excerpt. It should accurately describe the page; it is not guaranteed search-result wording.
Definition and sourcesMeta robots
Instructions to supporting crawlers about indexing or result presentation, supplied in HTML or X-Robots-Tag. Crawlers must access the response to read noindex. These instructions are not access controls.
Definition and sourcesMeta tags
HTML meta elements supplying metadata such as encoding or a description. Page titles use the separate title element. Adding meta keywords does not improve Google rankings.
Definition and sources